


Losing It

by Try2CatchMe



Category: Supernatural
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-04
Updated: 2013-04-04
Packaged: 2017-12-07 12:07:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/748330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Try2CatchMe/pseuds/Try2CatchMe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean might believe Kevin got spooked about the whole ‘weight of the world’ on his shoulders thing and took off because he couldn’t take it, but Sam thinks differently.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Losing It

**Author's Note:**

> Based off last night’s episode I ACTUALLY WROTE THIS, WHY DIDN’T SOMEONE STOP ME??

Twenty minutes after Dean falls asleep that night, Sam steals the Impala.

Dean might believe Kevin got spooked about the whole ‘weight of the world’ on his shoulders thing and took off because he couldn’t take it, but Sam thinks differently.

Kevin was on the brink of a total breakdown when they found him in the boat. Sam knows what it’s like to have pure evil in your head, not sure what’s real and what’s not. Lucifer nearly had him shoot himself, shoot Dean, had him so turned around he hardly knew which way was up. So yeah, Sam knows the signs. Paranoid, twitchy, Kevin had them in spades.

Dean probably hadn’t helped. Sam loves his brother, would die for him in a heartbeat and has, but Dean’s way of thinking is downright poisonous. Their dad had had it, ruined their childhood with it, and branded it into Dean’s mind. ‘Once you’re in the life, you’re in it for good. The only way out is when you’re dead’.

If Kevin had tried to talk to him and Dean had said those things, if Kevin had thought there was no end to this… that would have broken him so much faster.

He may have been able to avoid them before, but that was when he was at the peak of his game. Now? Now he’s going to be more worried about Crowley than anything.

Same has to take a second to think about what he would do in Kevin’s place. If he really believed Crowley was after him. He’d try to anticipate Crowley’s next move.

So he calls up Garth and gets Mrs. Tran’s location.

It takes convincing, it takes a  _lot_  of convincing. Garth may be a bit weird, but he’s still a hunter and they’re paranoid as a survival requirement.

He manages it, though, and turns the Impala onto the right highway.

Fortunately, it’s not that long a drive, just a couple of hours. That’s good, it’ll be best if he can get back before Dean wakes up.

The safe house is a shack in the middle of nowhere, big surprise. It’s warded extremely well, though, Sam can see that even before he parks the car.

Mrs. Tran opens the door and immediately showers him in holy water with a bright orange Super soaker. Then she’s interrogating him for news about her son, question after question with such worry and sincerity that Sam knows Kevin’s not here.

He assures her that Kevin’s fine, he was just in the area on a job and Garth called to ask him to drop by and see if she needed anything. She responds that she needs her son to be safe and he fights the urge to say that he’s working on it as he leaves.

Just as he’s starting to try to plan out his next move, he hears something in the woods.

Slipping a hand inside his jacket and grasping the demon knife, Sam stalks forward into the trees.

He follows the sound to a large tree several hundred yards in. Kevin’s pressed against it, shaking, hands over his ears, muttering Enochian to himself.

A muttered ‘Christo’ gets no reactions and Sam’s heart clenches a little at what he’s seeing.

“Kevin, hey,” the second he lays a hand on Kevin’s shoulder, the boy lashes out. It’s not hard at all to grab his wrists, the prophet isn’t thinking clearly at all.

The last thing Sam wants is for Mrs. Tran to come out here and see this, so he hauls Kevin up and bodily carries him to where he parked the Impala. The prophet fights the whole way, which isn’t really a surprise, but he’s so exhausted and malnourished that he’s about as dangerous as a kitten, less so really, because kittens have surprisingly sharp claws and teeth.

Getting him actually  _inside_  the Impala is an adventure that ends with them both sprawled in a tangle across the front seat.

It has to be the Impala that breaks through to Kevin. Maybe it’s the feel of the leather, maybe it’s the smell (of gasoline, leather, greasy food, and blood), maybe the Impala has just been through so much with them that there’s something supernatural about it now.

In any case, it’s like Kevin breaks right there. Sam suddenly finds his arms full as the prophet clings to him and out-and-out  _sobs_.

It has been a very,  _very_  long time since Sam had to comfort anyone that wasn’t a grieving witness they were interviewing and that was part of the job. This is _Kevin_  and it’s not just a detached sense of sympathy that lessened by the year, this is a heart-wrenching empathy and Sam just wants to wrap the teenager in his arms and make the devil in his mind disappear.

So that’s what he does. The Winchester brand of comfort mostly involves extremely awkward  conversations in the Impala that everyone silently promises to pretend never happened once they’re over. The only thing that had called Sam out of his own hallucinations had been pain, but he’s not exactly going to slice Kevin open while he’s having a breakdown and he doesn’t want to at all.

He improvises. Kevin’s small enough that Sam can wrap his arms around him and then some. He smells like generic shampoo and sweat, like he remembered Dean’s advice to shower occasionally, but also like he might have run the whole way here.

Sam tightens his arms carefully, not enough to hurt, never enough to hurt, but enough so Kevin can  _feel_  him, knows Sam is there and very,  _very_  real.

He says it out loud too, “I’m here, I’m real. Crowley can’t get you Kev, not while I’m here,” useless babble that still seems necessary.

Kevin cries himself to sleep right there in Sam’s arms. It doesn’t take long, he’d been so exhausted.

It takes some twisting, but Sam manages to get all the car doors closed and the Impala turned on. He manages to buckle Kevin in, despite the fact that he’s still lying across the front seat, head in Sam’s lap, just enough so he won’t fall off the seat if Sam has to slam on the brakes.

Besides, Sam remembers what the nightmares were like with Lucifer. He’d wake up sometimes curled in the tightest protective ball he could manage or jolt back to awareness because he’d fought his way out of bed in his sleep. Even when they get back to the bunker, Sam probably won’t feel comfortable leaving Kevin to sleep alone.

He drives much more slowly on the way back, he has plenty of time to get back before Dean wakes up, especially with that new memory foam mattress of his.

He leaves Kevin’s head right where it is, running his hand through the prophet’s hair whenever his breathing gets uneven until the teen calms down again.

It’s not perfect, but Sam’s going to makes sure Kevin doesn’t fall to pieces like he did, even if he has to put off the trials indefinitely.

It’s the least he can do.


End file.
